From Life Behind the IRon Drape, a blog by Mark Hubbard which critiques New Zealand’s IRD (Inland Revenue Department):

FATCA: The (NZ) Officials’ Report – A Crime That Deserves a Revolution

Here is an excerpt from this powerful evisceration of New Zealand’s new tax policy report heralding that country’s own IGA with the US:

Yesterday IRD Tax Policy published a 310 page document, part of which was the officials’ response to the IGA between NZ and the US, and FATCA, and the submissions made against both by the public. That report becomes a good object lesson to all submitters of what a whitewash such exercises are, and what a sham our statist captured democratic processes have become.  The report proper started at page 112 of the document: it is sadly unsurprising the first 111 pages dealt with what you might have thought was such a simple thing as how employee allowances are to be dealt with (such is the complexity of our taxing legislation). Although I could only make it to page 117 before my eyes were so blurred with tears of fury, and I had no interest in reading on, even in these five pages, look at what this report says about our society, and our world, in 2014.

New Zealand tax officials have just confessed, quite casually, to the creation of the full, one-world police surveillance state under the auspices, sorry, the outright bullying, of our US masters.

Read more

Social Security, Treasury target taxpayers for their parents’ decades-old debts

Do we need to look any further for confirmation that the United States has become a criminal enterprise?  Now it has started to assess debt based upon the alleged overpayment their parents’ Social Security 10 to 40 years in the past, and then confiscating the tax returns of the children. Read the article above to understand how childish, incompetent and rapacious the IRS has become. It would be hilariously funny if it wasn’t so scary.

Of course, we already knew that the IRS was a criminal organization, though a few detractors of this website have demurred. The OVDI/OVDP programs (i.e., Overseas Voluntary Disclosure Initiative/Program) sets out to confiscate a certain percentage of a so-called citizen’s “foreign” assets, while waiving every single Constitutional right of the victim. But it is nice to see it confirmed in such bold terms as out and out theft by the IRS, and this is happening to Homelanders!

This overpayment scheme is brilliant on the part of the IRS, since the victim has no way of proving that an overpayment wasn’t made or if they had already discharged the debt.  That is if they fail to keep records for several decades. I LOLed at the following lines:

“While we are responsible for collecting delinquent debts owed to taxpayers, we understand the importance of ensuring that debtors are treated fairly,” Treasury’s Schramek said in a statement responding to questions from The Washington Post. He said Treasury requires that debtors be given due process.

United States Federal Government bureaucrats obviously have no concept of fair treatment and due process.  The principle of inter-generational justice is Jeremiah 31.29-30 (ESV):

In those days they shall no longer say: ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.’ But everyone shall die for his own iniquity. Each man who eats sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge.

But today in the United States, the new due process is this: If the IRS says that the fathers ate sour grapes thirty years ago, the children’s teeth are set on edge.

Fiscaal Nieuws from the Netherlands reports on the case of a Dutch-American dual-citizen who appealed to the Dutch Board for the Protection of Human Rights after his investment account with BinckBank was closed following the signing of the FATCA IGA by the Dutch government on December 18, 2013.

Here is a translation of the article kindly supplied by Innocente:

FATCA unlawful discrimination by banning US customers

April 10, 2014

The American X has lived in the Netherlands since 1970 and also has US citizenship in addition to Dutch. He had an investment account with BinckBank (“Alex”). On December 1, 2013 BinckBank ended the relationship because X had not shown that he is not liable for taxes in the United States. X approached the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights to claim that BinckBank engaged in unlawful discrimination due to citizenship. BinckBank argued that it had terminated all 150 US customers who met the definition of “US Person”, used by the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS), because it refused to comply with requirements resulting from the planned Dutch legislation in response to the US Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) to provide all transactions and historical transaction data by US Persons to the Dutch Tax Authorities. According to BinckBank the discrimination was based on a generally binding regulation, because the agreement on December 18, 2013 between the Netherlands and the US Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA) for the implementation of FATCA forced it to do so . The Institute left open the question whether the IGA was a generally binding regulation because the IGA did not require BinckBank to close its customer accounts because of their US citizenship The Board also rejected the appeal by BinckBank for reasonableness and fairness, as the broad obligations required by FATCA brought disproportionately heavy costs. The law, in the General Equal Treatment Act (Equal Treatment Act), explicitly states that direct discrimination on grounds of citizenship was not only prohibited, except for exceptions included in the Equal Treatment Act itself. Honoring the appeal made by BinckBank on reasonableness and fairness would be contrary to the closed system of the Act. The Board concluded that BinckBank had engaged in unlawful discrimination in the provision of services on grounds of citizenship.

http://www.futd.nl/fiscaal-nieuws/7286/door-fatca-weren-van-amerikaanse-klanten-verboden-onderscheid/

Stephen Kish and Lynne Swanson have reviewed the legal opinion provided by constitutional lawyer Mr. Joseph Arvay on the constitutionality of the pending legislation “Canada-United States Enhanced Tax Information Exchange Agreement Implementation Act”. This act is aimed at implementing the “Intergovernmental Agreement” (IGA) designed to make the “Foreign Account Tax Compliant Act” (FATCA) operative in Canada.

The opinion has also been discussed with Mr. John Richardson, a Toronto lawyer, with whom we now have solicitor-client privilege, and who will be part of Dr. Kish’s and Ms. Swanson’s “litigation committee”.

The lengthy opinion provides in detail the pros and cons of the arguments, and possible outcomes.

There are good arguments that the proposed legislation infringes at a minimum on constitutionally protected rights and freedoms. Nevertheless, there are also arguments that the Government of Canada may employ to counter our position and, we emphasize, there is no certainty that litigation will be successful. Further, any litigation will be hard fought and very expensive. This litigation is not for the faint of heart.

Given the opinion of Mr. Arvay and discussion with Mr. Richardson, we advise that it is our intention to take all necessary steps to commence litigation against the Government of Canada once the IGA implementation legislation is enacted. Moreover, the nature and impact of the unprecedented legislation on all persons in Canada and those throughout the world who will be impacted by FATCA demands that we exercise this option that is in the public interest.

Very significant fundraising will be required.

Stephen Kish
Lynne Swanson

[Cross-posted on Maple Sandbox]

To help you judge if,

your experience with your local bank, credit union or insurance company (or as the US defines them: “foreign financial institutions”) will be a comfortable one, as some advertise,

shared here are excerpts of notes from a meeting set up with a “US Person” and Canadian husband by a Vice-President of the wealth management branch of one of the Big Five Canadian banks: Continue reading →

Stephen Kish and Lynne Swanson today received a very lengthy and comprehensive legal opinion, from constitutional lawyer Joseph Arvay, on the constitutionality of Canada’s pending FATCA IGA legislation.

Stephen Kish

[Cross-posted at Maple Sandbox by Lynne Swanson]

People who feel the need to confirm their attendance to the Alberta sessions for either Calgary or Edmonton can respond by email to me via the following Kijiji ads:

Calgary Session
Edmonton Session

I will pass on the number of confirmed people for the Calgary session to Calgary411

Thanks!
~ GwEvil ~

This is cross-posted from http://maplesandbox.ca/2014/what-we-leave-behind/ and was originally posted there on Jan 9, 2014. It is the text of a letter that was sent to the Honourable James Flaherty.

The Honourable James Flaherty, P.C., M.P.

Minister of Finance
House of Commons,
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0A6

Re: Minister Flaherty, how do you want to be remembered?

Dear Minister Flaherty:

There comes a time in many (not all that’s for sure) people’s lives when they wonder what they have accomplished, and what they will leave behind after their time on this planet is up. I’m at that point. And I feel like I’ve not accomplished much; at least nothing on a global scale. Sure, I’ve been a ‘good person’, always an exemplary employee, pretty good mom, polite to a fault, paid all my taxes (at least the ones I knew about it, and to the government of the country I’ve lived in all my working life), but I will leave nothing behind that the world will remember me by. Not that that’s a bad thing as it is the reality for 99.99% of all of us.

What about you? Will the world remember you? Will Canada?
Will your name go down in the history books? And if it does, what would you want to be remembered for?

Do you want to be remembered, as the Canadian Finance Minister who caved and signed on to FATCA and solidified US domination of the world forever more, or as the person who changed the direction of the world because he had the balls to say ‘NO’ to the USA bully? Because that would take huge balls! And that would surely get you remembered not just as a very ‘good person’, but as someone instrumental in positive global change.

A lot is at stake here. Not just for ‘US persons’ in Canada (or elsewhere), but for people of every citizenship living everywhere in the world, and for their children, though most don’t know it yet, and many never will. But the history books will tell the story.

You have a chance – I don’t – to write history. Don’t blow it. People like me are counting on you. Feel free to pass this letter on to your boss, if you think it will help change the course of history.

Sincerely,
Xxxxxxxx Xxxxx (real name not hidden from Flaherty)
Canadian citizen since birth in 19xx (unfortunately also born with red/white/blue tattoo)